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TERRORISM

Spanish police detain man suspected of role in Brussels terror attack

Spanish police said Friday that they had arrested a man suspected of having links with an Islamist gunman who killed two Swedish football fans in Brussels this month.

Published: 27 October 2023 15:18 CEST
Spanish police detain man suspected of role in Brussels terror attack
Spanish police said they opened their investigation into the suspect arrested in Benahavís after being informed by Belgian authorities that he might have had links to Lassoued. Photo: Policía Nacional/Twitter

Officers arrested the unidentified suspect — who is wanted in Belgium for drug and arms trafficking, money laundering and membership in a criminal group — in the southern town of Benahavís, an operation carried out with the help of Spanish intelligence agency CNI, police said in a statement.

A radicalised 45-year-old Tunisian, Abdesalem Lassoued, shot and killed the Swedish fans before a Belgium-Sweden football match on October 16th, and was later killed in a police operation.

Lassoued had escaped from a Tunisian prison where he was serving a long sentence, but Belgian authorities failed to deal with an August 2022 extradition request made by Tunisian officials.

Spanish police said they opened their investigation into the suspect arrested in Benahavís after being informed by Belgian authorities that he might have had links to Lassoued.

“The investigation determined that both were linked around criminal activities related with organised crime,” the statement said.

Police searched the home of the suspect, seizing documents, electronic devices and  a “significant amount of money”.

The suspect was carrying fake identity documents at the time of his arrest, police added.

French police have arrested four people as part of the investigation into Lassoued’s possible accomplices.

Police in Belgium have arrested and charged a 44-year-old Tunisian man suspected of being an accomplice to Lassoued.

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CRIME

Spain prosecutors seek to close Shakira’s second tax fraud case

Spanish prosecutors on Wednesday moved to dismiss a tax fraud case against Shakira just months after opening proceedings against the Colombian superstar over unpaid taxes of €6.6 million.

Published: 8 May 2024 12:35 CEST
Spain prosecutors seek to close Shakira's second tax fraud case

“The Barcelona provincial prosecutor’s office for economic crimes has requested that the proceedings against Shakira be closed … for the 2018 tax year,” the prosecutors office said in a statement, pointing to “insufficient evidence”.

Prosecutors opened the case in July, accusing the so-called Queen of Latin Pop of using a network of companies, some of them based in tax havens, to cheat the tax office out of €6.6 million in 2018, including interest and adjustments.

A month later, the singer paid €6.6 million to settle the debt, her agent told AFP.

In November, the singer reached a last-minute settlement with prosecutors to avoid trial in another tax fraud case involving income she earned between 2012 and 2014.

Prosecutors had accused her of defrauding the Spanish state of €14.5 million in charges she denied, saying she only moved to Spain full-time in 2015.

As part of the deal, she agreed to pay a fine of €7.3 million, equal to 50 percent of the amount of unpaid tax, along with a €432,000 fine, raising the total to nearly €7.8 million.

Now 47, the singer lives in Miami where she moved in April 2023 with her two sons after a bitter split from former Barcelona football star Gerard Piqué.

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